The Mercy of the Fallen
by celeria
Summary: Alex questions the depth of her own mercy after the Andrea Brown Case. Set post-"Mercy" (season 4 episode 14). Alex/Olivia, implied slash.


Set after the episode "Mercy" (season 4 episode 14, the one with the mercy killing of infant Sarah Brown by her mother, Andrea). This fic contains slash, specifically Alex/Olivia slash, but the slash factor is basically nonexistent. I can't be bothered to write "how they got together" fic, nor am I good at it, so for the purposes of this fic we'll assume that they're in an established relationship.

Rated PG-13 for content and implied slash.

Yes, the title of this fic is blatantly stolen from Dar Williams' song by the same name. It comes from her new album "The Beauty of the Rain."

Special thanks to all the readers and reviewers who liked my last SVU fic, Jealousy.

* * *

The New York night was still cold as Alex Cabot made her way home to her apartment. A light wind was picking up from the river, and Alex shivered, standing outside her apartment building and looking up to her floor. A solitary lamp burned like a silhouette against the drawn windowshade, giving an illusion of warm, expansive light. In reality, the living room and kitchen were dark as Alex twisted her key in the lock and shoved hard, annoyed as usual that she had once again neglected to tell her landlord about the sticking door.

The red light on her answering machine was blinking frantically as Alex dropped her briefcase and shrugged out of her long dark coat and soft violet wool scarf, leaving them in a heap on the couch. She hit the play button before making her way into the kitchen and reaching automatically for the coffee still sitting in the bottom of the pot, left over from this morning's breakfast – Alex grimaced at the thought of how long ago that was. "Two new messages," announced the recorded voice. "First message."

She poured the coffee carelessly into a battered mug, sloshing a bit of it over the rim and onto her hand. The dark liquid stained her pale skin briefly to a light tan color, and she stuck her hand under the faucet for a moment before putting the coffee into the microwave to reheat. "Ms. Cabot, this is Charlie Phillips," the message blared from the small speaker. "Saw the coverage on the Brown case. Good work, kid. Give me a call at the office, (212) 555-3811. Goodnight."

Ordinarily Alex would have been thrilled to get what qualified as high praise from the DA. Tonight she opened the microwave roughly and took a careless sip of coffee, burning her tongue and the side of her mouth in the process.

"Second message." Alex blew across the surface of the liquid, watching shiny rings from her breath form inside the cup. "Alex, it's me. Listen, I saw Munch after he got back from court, and I was wondering if you'd like to talk about it. Call me back."

The electronic beeping of the machine signaled the end of the recorded calls, and Alex made an automatic move to erase them. Her slender white fingers tapped quickly at the delete button, once, twice, then hovered over the receiver.

Her first instinct was to ignore the people waiting for her to call back, to crawl into the shower and let her strength and her spine collapse under the weight of scalding hot water. To curl up in bed wrapped in comfortable layers of cotton and silk, alone with just her blankets and pillows and irrevocable sense of shame. But it was early yet, she glanced at her watch. Yes, still early. She should return that call.

She picked up the phone and dialed the number that she hadn't gotten around to putting on speed-dial yet.

* * *

Olivia Benson was sitting in the dingiest corner of her couch, tucked in with a hand-knit crocheted afghan around her sweatpants-clad legs, when the telephone rang. She was pretending to study the Jane Doe case file – it was all sitting on the coffee table in front of her, the manila folder open and inviting with all the details of the rape, murder, and dump in an abandoned warehouse – but the morning edition of the _New York Times_ kept calling her. She hadn't had to read more than a paragraph before she found the article on the Brown mercy killing. The papers had not been kind to ADA Alexandra Cabot this morning. She was wondering what would be splashed across the pages the next morning as she picked up the phone. "Hello?"

"It's me. I got your message."

"Hi." Olivia glanced across the room involuntarily, her brown eyes finding the delicate wooden clock hanging on the opposite wall. "It's early."

"I just got in. I didn't feel like staying tonight."

"Well, I understand." Olivia leaned back against the cushions, pulling up her knees and pushing the stray end of the afghan underneath her ankles. "How are you feeling?"

"Honestly?" Olivia heard Alex expel a brisk breath of air, despite the fact that honesty over the phone was not her strong suit. "Like a cheap lawyer, Olivia. A cheap lawyer who did the right thing for her own cause, but not for the victim."

"Alex, Sarah Brown didn't deserve to die. She was an innocent victim in this case."

There was a short silence, and then Alex's words came out clipped. "Not her."

Olivia cut her eyes toward the clock again, then tapped her pen on the sheaf of newsprint. "Look, it's not real late. Have you had dinner yet?"

"I'm not hungry, no."

"Coffee?"

"Reheating this morning's, but thank you."

"Forget the food, then. Would you like me to come over?"

"Olivia, I – "

It was Olivia's turn to sigh. "Alex, in case you haven't noticed, I'm _worried_ about you."

There was another silence, and then Alex replied, her words mixed with air, "I'll buzz you in."

* * *

Olivia's cheeks were lightly flushed, either from the chilly night air or the jog up the stairs to Alex's floor, when Alex opened the door. "Hi," Alex said as she slid the chain lock off the door and opened it wide enough so that Olivia could come in. "That was fast. I didn't know the buses were on at this hour."

"I took a cab." Olivia pulled off her casual parka and dropped it on the couch next to Alex's coat. She was lightly rumpled in sweats and a long-sleeved t-shirt from Hudson University, where Stabler's daughter Maureen went to school, and Alex felt suddenly overdressed in her crisp-pressed courtroom attire. "How are you?" Her hello kiss slid off the corner of Alex's mouth and Alex felt a sudden, pressing desire to be somewhere else, or at least in more comfortable clothes.

"I'm fine. How was your day?"

"The usual. We have a rape victim, Jane Doe, no ID, no distinguishing marks, raped, strangled, dumped in an abandoned warehouse. Elliot and I are running the MO and location through the FINDER, but even so, it'll take a few hours."

"So you're off for the night. Coffee?"

"You mean the sludge you like to reheat twenty hours later? No thanks. I'll make some tea." Olivia laid a gentle hand on Alex's suit-clad shoulder as she walked past her toward the kitchen. "Yes, we're off for the night. We can't do much more until morning anyway."

"How old is she?" Alex asked, following Olivia into her small kitchen and resting her fingertips lightly against the gray cotton fabric at her back.

"Young. Maybe fourteen." Olivia filled the teakettle with water, set it on the stove, then turned to face Alex. One finger traced the C-shape made by the curve of blonde hair at Alex's temple. "She looks so innocent."

"I'm sure." Alex stepped awkwardly out of the physical contact, and the cool air of her apartment closed around her, separating her from Olivia. "I'm going to go change. Do you mind?"

"Of course not." Olivia looked at her steadily, her fingers still stretched toward Alex's cheek, but made no move to follow her. "I'll bring your coffee out to you."

A few moments later Alex was sitting with her legs tucked under her, much more comfortable in loose cotton pants and a baggy shirt than she had been in the tailored suit. Olivia poured the hot water over her teabag and then took the kettle off the heat, carrying both steaming mugs into the living room. "So. Tell me what's going on."

Alex took a long sip of the bitter coffee and fought not to make an involuntary face. Olivia was right, it _was_ rather like sludge, but damned if she was going to give her the satisfaction of being right. "It was a hard case, Olivia."

"Munch was pretty shaken up by it." Olivia wiggled her fingers on the armrest of the couch, and Alex knew that if she had a pen with her, she'd be tapping it by now. "I don't think you expected anything less when you went in, did you, Alex?"

"No, but … Olivia, we won."

"Munch said."

"I suppose he did." Alex raised the mug to her lips again. "I think he was disappointed in me. Frankly, I'm rather disappointed in myself."

"Why?"

"I shouldn't have won that case."

Olivia put her tea down and reached across the couch. Her hand was warm from holding the mug against her palm. "Alex, she killed her child."

"Yes."

"Even though Sarah had Tay-Sachs, it didn't matter. You can't kill a baby just because she has an incurable disease."

"I know. That's not where I disagree with you, Olivia."

"Then, what?" Olivia pressed her fingers against Alex's wrist, and after a moment Alex stretched out her hand to catch Olivia's thumb between her fingertips. "Where do you disagree?"

Alex was quiet as the only sound in the room was the nearly-inaudible whisper of her skin against Olivia's, until she replied, "What I said to the jury convinced them. When I said that she killed her daughter to cover up her affair - it was true, Olivia. I'm sure it was true. I just don't know how true."

She hesitated, wondering if she was making herself clear, and felt Olivia's fingers travel up her arm. "She loved her baby, Olivia. Whatever else I got out of her on the stand, everyone could see, she loved her baby."

"So you think she did it more out of love than self-preservation?"

"I told the jury no."

"But you, Alex, what do _you_ think?"

A pause, and then Alex shrugged, not shrugging off the question, but a tired shrug, because she didn't have a real answer either way. "I should not have won my case like that."

Knowing that it was an answer of its own, Olivia didn't push any further. "Munch told me what you said. About turning her into a whore."

"I shouldn't have."

Olivia slid across the cushion that was separating them and wove her fingers into the silky-soft patterns of Alex's blonde hair. "Maybe not, but she committed murder, Alex. If Sarah hadn't had Tay-Sachs, any jury would have convicted in a heartbeat. And if Sarah had been another person's baby, whom Andrea Brown killed out of mercy, a jury would have convicted then too. She deserved _something_. She needs to know, and society needs to know, that you can't do that to a child."

"It isn't that." Alex shook her head briskly, struggling for words against the comforting weight of Olivia's hand and the reassuring warmth of her skin. Her cheeks suddenly felt very cold. "I understand what you're saying, and I know it's wrong. But Olivia – the look on her face. She looked like she was going to _die_. She looked like she would fall down and never get up. She went to hug her husband and she cried and I thought – _I did that_."

"You had to."

"I didn't have to."

"Your job is to see justice for the victim. Sarah Brown was a victim. Andrea Brown suffered too, but she was not the victim here."

"Wasn't she?" Alex glanced up at Olivia with eyes that looked very clear and tired without the usual black-framed glasses encircling them. Olivia started to disagree immediately, then thought better of it and closed her mouth, because she sensed that wasn't what Alex was driving at. "Olivia, I looked at her and her husband and I could _see_ everything they'd gone through. They felt as bad as I did – no, worse. And I wondered – how could they have more mercy than I did."

* * *

Olivia ran her hand down Alex's cheek, letting it rest on the slim, bony shoulder. Against her fingers Alex's hair was soft, so soft that it was nearly weightless against her tired fingers. For a second she saw a flicker of exhaustion flare in Alex's eyes, and then she straightened up, pulling back from Olivia very slightly. "I'm fine now, thank you."

Olivia studied Alex's eyes, watching them grow steely dark again, and knew that there were few right answers to that comment. "Let me know if you want to talk about it."

Alex just nodded, her eyes fluttering closed for a moment, and Olivia felt a flash of wrenching compassion tug at her stomach. She wondered how Alex could possibly question the depth of her mercy when she was this concerned over what she had done right, and wrong. She also knew that there was no way she could tell Alex that. Instead she picked up Alex's mug of half-drunk coffee and took it into the kitchen with her tea. The two shades of brown swirled together as they swept down the drain.

Olivia held out her hand to Alex, and after a moment she felt the cool, slender fingers grip her own. "Come on." She pulled hard, tugging Alex off the couch, and wrapped her arm around Alex's waist. "You need to get some sleep."

Alex nodded again as Olivia led her into her bedroom, tucking her into layers of silk sheets and cotton blankets and the warmth of her spooned hug. Outside in the living room, the single lamp turned off automatically, and the room went dark against the wind.

_finis___

**Author's Note:  Thank you once again for reading.  If you're so kind as to leave reviews, anyone want to comment on my Alex characterization?  I'm relatively comfortable writing Olivia, but Alex is something else – which bothers me since she's probably my favourite character.  Thanks.**


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